Penn State Football: McSorley And Moorhead Just Fine After Emotional Departure

As Joe Moorhead packed his things and headed to Mississippi State earlier in the month somewhere outside the Lasch Building an emotional Trace McSorley took out his phone and fired off a tweet.

It didn't last long, eventually deleted, evaporating into the digital air, but everyone saw it.

"I feel ya," McSorley said to Florida State quarterback Deondre Francios who had tweeted "No call, no text, you could have said something..." in the wake of Florida State coach Jimbo Fisher taking another job.

For McSorley it was a rare moment out of character. It is rare to find Penn State's quarterback doing anything other than placing broad blame on the team as a whole following losses. McSorley is a team player that manages to walk an informative company line in front of the media. He says what he's thinking, but he isn't trying to make headlines.

So a tweet, apparently directed towards Moorhead's departure was a surprise. Equally unexpected, that Moorhead would have left without much notice. He by all accounts if a coach that his players love and is simply on a human level a likable guy.

On Friday during Penn State's bowl media day, McSorley opened up about the tweet and the departure, and what has become a much happier ending for a player and coach so instrumental to Penn State's rise.

"At that point he was able to leave and I wasn't able to get in and talk to him before he left. I hadn't talked to him, hadn't heard from him and I was kind of upset at that point," McSorley said on Friday. "But since then I've had multiple conversations with him, he has texted a bunch of times and I'm extremely grateful and thankful for everything he has done for me in my career here and what he did for for this team. Bringing us back to this spot where we're having back-to-back 10-win seasons, what he has done in terms of changing the whole mentality of this program, it was a great opportunity."

"We were anticipating him...obviously all of these great jobs were opening up we figured someone was going to come calling, he's the best coordinator in the country in our eyes so it was something we were kind of able to anticipate happening and we're thankful for everything he has done and me and him are on great terms now."

The entire saga is one repeated around the country every year, teams and players waiting to see what is happening with their coaches. Only a day earlier defensive players eagerly awaited what Brent Pry might do with his future. Running backs coach Charles Huff leaving to join Moorhead a few weeks prior.

Are players left out in the cold waiting to find out what happens next? A bit, but as McSorley alluded to, it wasn't like they couldn't see it coming.

"It's going to be one of those things next year that if we see it on TV we definitely check it out," McSorley said about watching Mississippi State. "With the offense that we run, to be able to watch them score a touchdown and go 'Oh I know exactly what they did there' so that's going to be kind of cool."